Switching from Flycut to Maccy: A 10-Minute Migration Guide

Should you switch from Flycut to Maccy?

Switch if you want searchable history, image and rich-text support, pinned items, or finer control over what gets recorded. Stay with Flycut if the bezel-style, keyboard-cycling interface is the thing you love and you only ever copy plain text.

Both are free and open source, and both live in the menu bar. The difference is philosophy. Flycut is a text-snippet stack for developers. Maccy Mac is a general-purpose clipboard history that happens to be very fast and very small.

Flycut vs. Maccy at a glance

Area	Flycut	Maccy
Content types	Plain text	Text, rich text, images, and files
Finding old items	Cycle with the keyboard in the bezel; scroll the menu	Open the popup and just start typing to search
Pinning	No pinning	Pin items to the top of the list
Ignoring apps	Limited	Ignore specific apps and pasteboard types in Settings
Interface	Bezel HUD and menu	Menu-bar popup with search field and previews
License and price	Open source, free	Open source (MIT), free from GitHub and Homebrew; the App Store build is a paid option
Cloud sync	Optional sync options exist	None by design: local-first
Migration of old history	No official importer between the two

Treat the Flycut column as the thing to check against your own installed version. Flycut has had several maintainers over the years, and its feature set varies by build.

What you gain

Search instead of scrolling

This is the single biggest day-to-day change. In Maccy Clipboard you open the popup and type a few characters; the list filters as you type. With a history of a few hundred items, that beats stepping through entries one at a time. Maccy’s search can also be switched to other matching modes (exact, regexp, fuzzy) in Settings .

Images and rich text

Flycut records text. If you copy a screenshot region or an image from a browser, it simply isn’t there later. Maccy keeps those items in the history, so “what was that screenshot I copied twenty minutes ago?” has an answer.

Pinning

Pin the snippets you paste constantly (an email signature, a staging URL, a shell one-liner) and they stay at the top of the list instead of scrolling away as your history fills. The default pin shortcut is Option+P while an item is highlighted .

Control over privacy

Clipboard managers see everything you copy, so what they refuse to record matters. Maccy lets you ignore specific applications and certain pasteboard types in Settings. Many password managers mark copied secrets as concealed or transient, and Maccy respects that convention by default . Check the Ignore tab before you trust it with anything sensitive.

What you give up

• The bezel workflow. If your muscle memory is “hotkey, tap through entries in the HUD, release to paste,” Maccy’s popup-and-search model will feel different for a few days.
• Your existing history. There’s no documented one-click import from Flycut . Anything you still need has to be copied or pinned by hand.
• Any Flycut-specific extras you’ve configured, such as sync or its snippet-stack behaviors. Check what you actually use before quitting it.

How to switch, step by step

1. Rescue what you still need from Flycut

Open Flycut’s history and skim it. Copy out anything you reuse (commands, templates, credentials excepted). You’ll paste these into Maccy and pin them in step 5. Be honest with yourself here: most of a clipboard history is disposable.

2. Install Maccy

The simplest route for most developers is Homebrew:

brew install maccy

You can also download the release from the project’s GitHub page or the Mac App Store. Maccy’s recent major versions require a fairly recent macOS release, so check the minimum version on the download page before installing on an older Mac .

3. Grant permissions

To paste directly into the frontmost app, Maccy needs the Accessibility permission. If you skip it, items are still copied to the clipboard and you paste manually with Command+V. You’ll find this under System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility.

4. Set your hotkey, and avoid a collision

Maccy’s default global shortcut is Shift+Command+C . If you want it to match your old Flycut habit, change it in Maccy’s Settings. Whatever you choose, quit Flycut first. Two apps registering the same global shortcut is the most common cause of “the hotkey does nothing” reports after a switch, and two clipboard managers polling the pasteboard at once will also each record every copy.

5. Configure the essentials

1. Launch at login: turn it on in Settings so history is recorded from boot.
2. History size: set a limit you’ll actually use. A few hundred items is plenty for most people.
3. Ignore list: add your password manager and any app you’d rather not record.
4. Paste behavior: decide whether selecting an item pastes immediately or only copies it, and whether it pastes without formatting.
5. Pins: paste your rescued snippets one at a time, open Maccy, highlight each, and pin it.

6. Remove Flycut’s login item and quit it

Quit Flycut, then remove it from System Settings → General → Login Items so it doesn’t relaunch and compete for the pasteboard. Keep the app in your Applications folder for a week or two if you want a safety net, then delete it.

Keyboard habits: translating your muscle memory

You used to…	In Maccy, do this
Hit the hotkey and arrow through entries	Hit the hotkey and type a few letters of what you want; arrow keys still move through the list
Scroll to find an old snippet	Pin it so it’s always at the top
Hope a copied secret wasn’t recorded	Ignore the app, or the pasteboard type, in Settings
Clear history to start fresh	Use Maccy’s clear-history command from the menu

Common problems after switching

The hotkey doesn’t open Maccy

Another app is almost certainly holding that shortcut, often Flycut still running in the background. Quit it, or pick a different combination in Maccy’s Settings.

Maccy opens but won’t paste into the app

Check the Accessibility permission. If it’s already listed, toggle it off and on again; macOS sometimes keeps a stale entry after an app update.

Items from a specific app are missing

That’s usually the ignore list or a concealed pasteboard type doing its job. Check Settings → Ignore before assuming a bug.

An honest verdict

Maccy isn’t a “better Flycut”; it’s a different tool with a different center of gravity. If your clipboard use is mostly short text snippets cycled with the keyboard, Flycut may still feel more natural. If you’ve ever lost a screenshot, wished you could search your history, or worried about what your clipboard manager is silently recording, Maccy fixes those specific problems, and it does it while staying small, local, and open source.

Give it a full working week before judging. The first two days are muscle-memory friction; after that, search-first usually wins.

Once you’re settled in, a good next step is auditing your ignore list. What’s the one app you’d least want your clipboard history to remember?

FAQ

Can I import my Flycut history into Maccy?

There is no documented importer, so plan on copying over only the items you still need and pinning them .

Is Maccy really free?

Maccy is open source under the MIT license and free to download from GitHub or install with Homebrew. The Mac App Store build is offered as a paid option .

Does Maccy sync across Macs?

No. Maccy is deliberately local-first, so your clipboard history stays on the machine.

Can I run Flycut and Maccy together?

You can, but you shouldn’t for long. Both will record every copy, and their global shortcuts can conflict. Use one as a trial period, not a permanent setup.

Does Maccy record passwords from my password manager?

Most password managers flag copied secrets as concealed, and Maccy honors that by default . For certainty, add your password manager to Maccy’s ignore list.